


the heat of battle

by injeong



Category: Heaven Official's Blessing, 天官赐福 - 墨香铜臭 | Tiān Guān Cì Fú - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù
Genre: Angst, Feels, FengQing, Fluff, I love him, Idiots in Love, M/M, Oblivious Pining, Pei Ming is a love guru, Pining, TGCF - Freeform, a bit of humor, they're both very blind
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-17
Updated: 2020-12-17
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:54:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28137270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/injeong/pseuds/injeong
Summary: Feng Xin tries to pretend that everything is fine (it's not) and Mu Qing attempts to deny his feelings (he fails) and everything both spirals out of control and falls into place at the same time.aka Feng Xin and Mu Qing realise they've been pining after each other for way too fucking long and finally get their act together.
Relationships: Feng Xin & Mu Qing (Tiān Guān Cì Fú), Feng Xin/Mu Qing (Tiān Guān Cì Fú)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 196





	the heat of battle

**Author's Note:**

> me, holding fengqing in my arms, sobbing: they're so fucking stupid i love them  
> i was listening to a sad bunch of songs while writing this so it turned out angstier than i intended but like, i'm just going to roll with it and see what happens?

The heat of battle made the mind do strange things. 

At first, Feng Xin had thought it was a human thing, a mortal thing. He was young back then, after all - barely out of his teenage years, and the stifling atmosphere of the royal court with all their overbearing etiquette probably didn't do much to settle his mind. The only time he could really live, really feel alive, was during a fight, with the clear ringing of swords and thundering of rushing blood, the ache of fatigue in his limbs and the familiar feeling of a bowstring tugging taunt against his fingers. 

If, in those heated moments, he just happened to look over to see how Mu Qing was faring, and if he had just happened to notice the way that the sun lit him up with an ethereal glow, or those graceful movements that seemed more like a dancer's than a swordsman's, or the way his lips were parted as he paused for breath between fights ... 

Well. 

Feng Xin may have managed to come up with various excuses of questionable strength for those moments. For years, he resolutely ignored anything and everything that tiny part of his mind whispered to him, because it just didn't make sense. Mu Qing and him were like oil and water. He was confused. Confused, and maybe a little bit lonely. That was it. 

Then they both ascended, and that tiny part of his mind didn't disappear. In fact, if anything, it grew even larger, and Feng Xin had to force himself to look away and pretend not to notice every time Mu Qing, now General Xuan Zhen, walked into the hall, all heavenly glory and flowing robes and bright eyes and stupidly handsome voice. He shoved it down, all those nonsensical thoughts and feelings, buried deep underneath harsh words and petty fights and brawls. 

Try as he might, those nonsensical thoughts and feelings didn't go away. 

Feng Xin watched as Mu Qing stares blankly at the crowd of Heavenly Officials, that familiar bored expression on his face, and seethed silently. 

He hated it. The feelings of weakness, uncertainty, something that he hoped he would never have to feel again after he ascended (he had felt enough weakness and uncertainty in that time eight hundred years ago, and he never wanted to feel them again) - they all came bubbling up to the surface every time he laid eyes on Mu Qing. He didn't know how to deal with things like this. He knew how to fight his way out of bad situations with brute force and swear words. But something like this? 

As if he somehow felt the conflicted feelings radiating off Feng Xin's person, Mu Qing turned his head slightly, towards him. Feng Xin looked away before their eyes could meet. 

He kept his eyes averted, but didn't miss the look of vague confusion that crossed Mu Qing's face for a brief moment. 

A group of Heavenly Officials started to drone on about state matters and other things that Feng Xin honestly couldn't care less about. 

For a moment, he tried to imagine a different sort of world. If he didn't have those strange, uncomfortable feelings. Maybe, if he had been able to think straight around Mu Qing, their relationship wouldn't have ended up as it was now, confusing and twisted and undecipherable. 

He sneaked another glance at Mu Qing, who hadn't quite yet fully turned away. 

In the end, he gave it up. What use were fantasies to him?

  
It was just random luck that Mu Qing and a couple of his subordinates had been in the area at just the right time. Feng Xin had, admittedly, perhaps been a little too quick to jump down to the mortal realm to take care of the vengeful spirit by himself, but in his defence, he had been waiting for something to take his mind of -Mu Qing- things and this seemed to be the perfect opportunity. Only, it turned out to be a little more than he had bargained for. Even the Ling Wen palace hadn't discovered the fact that the annoying Severe-level ghost terrorising the village was actually a cover for an entire army of almost Wrath-level demons, so how was Feng Xin supposed to know? 

Feng Xin stumbled against the ruins of a small shack in the woods, blinking back the dark spots at the edge of his vision. He couldn't defeat the threat like this. Another Heavenly Official - Mu Qing was closest, Feng Xin had heard that he was patrolling the area only a few miles away. But - to call him here? While he was like this? 

It was a little shameful.

He realised how stupid that sounded afterwards. Mu Qing had seen him at his lowest points, through the centuries of their history. He had seen the resentful Feng Xin, the bitter, disloyal, conceited version of him, and ... well. 

"What the fuck do you want?" Mu Qing said immediately through the spiritual array, before Feng Xin even had a chance to speak. He could almost hear the eye roll. 

"I _may_ require some assistance," Feng Xin gritted out. It hurt his pride a bit - it always did, to ask for help, especially now when he was a martial god in his own right - but it didn't hurt as much as the bleeding gashes across his body, oozing a sort of demonic-looking black smoke that put him on edge. "Are you nearby, or not?" 

Mu Qing probably sensed the odd tone of his voice, because when he spoke again, he sounded serious. "What happened?" 

"That Severe-level ghost. There's more than a hundred of them, and they're -" 

Another wave of dizziness cut him off, and he looked down at his wounds, realising belatedly that there were already black tendrils twisting over his chest, looking very much like the markings of a demonic poison. Oops. 

"They're a little stronger than we thought," he managed. Mu Qing went silent for a moment.

"Hang on for two minutes. I'll be there." 

The communication array cut off, and Feng Xin sagged back against the ruined remains of a wall, trying his best to drown out the sounds of the ghosts, still prowling around in the darkness somewhere, looking for him. Right. Ghosts. There were still ghosts, still danger - he should get up, get ready. He tried to grip his bow tighter, hands slippery with blood, but his arms shook to much to hold it steady, and it dropped to the ground again. 

Oh, well. Mu Qing would be here soon. 

He didn't remember when he slipped into darkness, but he did remember waking up in his palace later to the sound of a strangely familiar voice, and opening his eyes to see a flash of silver hair disappearing out of his bedroom door. 

The heat of battle made the mind do strange things. 

For all of their animosity, Feng Xin and Mu Qing worked well together. It was as clear as day to anyone who might be looking - they didn't need words or signals to know what the other was going to do, and on those occasions when they fought side-by-side, they were unbeatable. 

Unfortunately, the downside of not having to think about battle tactics when fighting meant that Feng Xin's mind drifted to ... other subjects. 

Feng Xin angrily yanked another ten arrows out of his quiver, and did his best not to look at the stupidly elegant way that Mu Qing tore around the forest, cutting down ghost after ghost with practised ease. The thunk of arrowheads meeting their mark did nothing to quench the fire in his blood, the deep-set yearning and frankly embarrassing child-like hope - 

He didn't even notice the ghost about to bite his head off until Mu Qing appeared out of nowhere in a whirl of dark robes and silver, running it through and immediately turning to yell at him. 

"Would it fucking kill you to pay attention??" 

Feng Xin did his best not to go red, and instinctively spouted off a string of swear words that made Mu Qing roll his eyes and scowl. 

"It was your fault," he retorted, and Mu Qing gave him an incredulous look. 

" _My fault_? How the fuck is you being an idiot my fault?" 

Feng Xin didn't answer, gritting his teeth and turning away. This was impossible. He was impossible. Karma had finally caught up to him. 

Mu Qing was still staring at him, a strange sort of expression flitting over his face - exasperation, irritation, worry. 

It still made him weak, after all these years. 

It was pathetic, really. Feng Xin gripped his bow so hard it might have snapped, and decided, _fuck it._

"Go out with me," he blurted. 

Fuck. He actually said it. 

There was an almost-silence, filled with the sounds of dying zombies and wailing ghosts and Mu Qing's flustered spluttering. 

" _What_?" 

"Don't make me say it twice!" 

Eight hundred years of pining would have had to end at some point, surely, so why not now? Feng Xin hoped that the splattered blood on his face would hide his blush. He's suddenly glad that there's no other Heavenly Officials nearby. 

Mu Qing's jaw had dropped in a hilarious fashion. It seemed that he was too shocked to even roll his eyes - that really must have rattled him. 

"Are you fucking serious?" he screeched. "Right here? Right now?" 

Feng Xin dodged a zombie's outstretched arms and beheaded it swiftly with a single blow. 

"I - fuck, it just felt like the right moment?"

There was a short silence, during which Mu Qing's face went several shades of pink. 

"I'm going to fucking kill you," he roared, but if Feng Xin wasn't mistaken, Mu Qing's voice cracked at the end, and his ears had turned an adorable shade of red, and the usual undertone of _fuck-you_ in his voice had dissipated. Feng Xin struggled (and failed) to keep the smile off his face. 

Maybe he hadn't been so hopelessly alone as he had thought. 

Mu Qing had started shrieking incoherently, still blushing pink all the way to his ears, which attracted a few bewildered looks from the junior officials, and Feng Xin threw himself into the battle once more, a different sort of feeling singing in his veins. 

  
"You could have asked me at any other moment," Mu Qing grouched, tugging lightly at the end of the bandage around Feng Xin's arm and tying it in a knot. "Any other moment - and you just had to choose the one in which we were literally fighting for our lives?" 

Feng Xin rolled his eyes, still giddy with the realisation that Mu Qing _knew_ , that he had listened to Feng Xin's outburst and hadn't turned him down. "We weren't fighting for our lives. It was just a small army of mildly strong ghosts." 

"A small army of mildly strong ghosts that _bit a chunk out of your arm_. There's a massive hole the size of an apple, you idiot -" 

Mu Qing sounded annoyed, but now that Feng Xin listened closely, there's an undercurrent of exasperated concern there, too. He didn't know how he had managed to miss it all those years. Probably because he had been too busy staring at Mu Qing's -

He cleared his throat awkwardly. "I told you, you were distracting me." 

"With what?" Mu Qing looked honestly confused, and Feng Xin stifled a sigh. 

Then Mu Qing took one look at him, and stuttered into silence. 

"Oh," he said. "Oh. You've been - oh." 

He blushed again, and Feng Xin couldn't help but laugh. 

Mu Qing didn't know what exactly he had been waiting for all those years. 

He ignored all the times that Xie Lian nudged him and glanced over to Feng Xin with a pointed expression, and he kept up his mask every time Feng Xin seemed to linger, on the verge of doing or saying something that might have changed things. He didn't even know why he did it, not really - all those times he pretended not to see Feng Xin start towards him, all those times he turned away before anything could happen. He always hated himself afterwards, watching the tormented, crestfallen expression flicker over Feng Xin's face before he, too, left, but he could never bring himself to do anything different. 

Perhaps it was fear, or perhaps the centuries of bitterness and misunderstood resentment had stained their relationship too much for it to ever be what Mu Qing dreamed about. Perhaps, sometime along the way, Mu Qing had convinced himself that this was for the better, that it was in both of their best interests to keep their distance, to continue to build up the protective walls around them, layered with biting words and arguments and fists and swords. 

It didn't make him any less miserable, but he stuck to the belief anyway. 

"You're getting really pitiful, you know that, General?" said Pei Ming, leaning against a pillar and chewing on the stem of a flower. Mu Qing scowled as respectfully as he could. 

"Excuse me?" 

"I'm an expert," Pei Ming continued, either nor hearing or ignoring him. "I have experience in these things, and you don't - and I'm telling you, you're pining. Ridiculously." 

Mu Qing choked on air. 

"I am not." 

Ridiculous. Unfathomable. 

Pei Ming snorted, waving a hand carelessly. "I mean, I can't blame you. Look at all these couples around! No wonder you're looking so lonely."

"I am not lonely/," Mu Qing stressed. Pei Ming looked unconvinced, and, sure, maybe it hadn't escaped Mu Qing's notice that there had been a definite increase in romantic activity these days - that entire fiasco with Hua Cheng and His Highness (he still had nightmares about those murals sometimes), and whatever Quan Yi Zhen had going for his shixiong, and he was also pretty sure that he had caught the Lord Wind Master making out with the Lord Earth Master behind a temple at some point a few years ago. But none of that affected him. He was doing fine. 

"It's really not that hard," Pei Ming said gleefully. "Lighten up a little? There are plenty of mortal women - or men, if you want - who would be more than willing. You could even find a more permanent partner up here, if you wanted. I've seen some Heavenly Officials make that work -" 

"My cultivation method -" 

"Psh. As if that stopped His Highness. Look at him now, he's as strong as ever!" 

Shuddering, Mu Qing forcefully erased from his mind that one memory of him walking in on the two. "His Highness is different. And besides -" 

"Or what about General Nan Yang? Some of your followers already think of you that way, you know that? The protectors of the southwest and the southeast, and the intimacy that arose from eight centuries of companionship -" 

Mu Qing let out an undignified squeak. Pei Ming, realising that he had hit the mark, beamed. 

" _No_." 

It was completely and entirely Pei Ming's fault. Mu Qing wouldn't be dealing with a resurgence of everything he had long since buried if it hadn't been for Pei Ming's stupid meddling. 

What about General Nan Yang? 

He scoffed. Him and Feng Xin. Qi Rong ascending to the Heavens would be more likely, wouldn't it? 

And yet ...

Mu Qing grumbled and complained and swung his sword around his room, but it didn't change the fact that he had, in fact, thought about it before. How could he not? In their youth, Feng Xin had been the only person other than His Highness who actually talked to him, even if the words exchanged were usually shouted and accompanied with swearing. Feng Xin, even back then, always had that sort of aura, and Mu Qing couldn't help but be drawn to him - loud, brash Feng Xin, with his blunt honesty and hot temper and absolute, undying loyalty. 

Mu Qing would be lying if he said that he had never taken a second glance, never lingered behind on the training grounds just to see glimpses of Feng Xin sparring with the other soldiers, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows, all lean muscle and nimble fingers and bronzed skin under the late evening sun. He would be lying if he said he never imagined a different set of circumstances, a slightly different life, where he could maybe brush their shoulders together as they walked, or hide their entwined hands under the folds of their robes, or lie together on a quiet afternoon and talk about nothing. 

"What are you staring at?" Feng Xin had asked, quirking an eyebrow as they took a break between sparring sessions, and Mu Qing had flushed, pretending to adjust his grip on his training sword. 

"Nothing," he said. 

That was all those years ago. So much had changed since then. Ascending, after those short and brutal years of bitterness and betrayal and hurt, the trials and tribulations of the Heavenly Court. White No-Face, the White-Clothed Calamity, and His Highness's three ascensions and everything that came with them. Jun Wu, Mount Tonglu, broken bridges and burning rivers and hesitant beginnings of friendships. 

And still, somehow, not much had changed at all. Feng Xin still flew off the handle at the smallest provocation, and Mu Qing still rolled his eyes at everything he said, and the neighbouring Heavenly Officials didn't even blink an eye anymore when they walked out into the street and saw the two Generals brawling in the corner. Mu Qing still caught himself staring, sometimes. 

It both comforted and pained him at the same time. 

He wasn't sure if he could risk everything he had, that fragile, new sort of peace that settled between them after the events at Tonglu, just to try. 

He had made peace with himself. Mu Qing told himself over and over again. He wouldn't waste time and energy chasing so fruitlessly after something that had been out of his reach for centuries. He would put it - everything - behind him, carefully gather up those feelings and lock them away somewhere until he forgot about them, and maybe he and Feng Xin could at least become friends, eventually.

  
And then Feng Xin went and said, "Go out with me", in the middle of a battle and completely obliterated Mu Qing's carefully laid out plans of forgetting everything. 

He wasn't sure if he had heard right. Feng Xin seemed just as surprised as he was, eyes widening comically, and the zombie blood splattered over his face did nothing to hide his blush. Mu Qing's brain short-circuited.

"What?" 

"Don't make me say it twice!" 

So he hadn't heard it wrong. Feng Xin really - 

Mu Qing wanted to scream. He hacked down a nearby zombie with much more force than necessary, reducing it to a bloody pulp, and it did nothing to quench the sudden roaring fire that burst into life within him, from the smouldering embers that hadn't been as dead as he thought. 

"Are you fucking serious?" he shrieked, and - oh no, he could feel the tell-tale heat rising up over his cheeks. "Right here? Right now?" 

_You really couldn't have said that before?_

Mu Qing's hands were trembling, and he fought to keep himself from doing something stupid like dropping his sword in the middle of a horde of zombies.

"I - fuck, it just felt like the right moment?" Feng Xin looked at him helplessly, that hilariously aghast expression still lingering on his face. He looked torn, terrified and relieved all at the same time, and Mu Qing let out a breath he hadn't known he had been holding. 

_Are you telling me we both spent eight hundred years doing nothing when we could have -_

Mu Qing felt himself go pink.

"I'm going to fucking kill you -"

His voice broke at the end, and even to his own ears, he could hear the uncharacteristic lack of annoyance in his voice. As always, Feng Xin understood what he really meant without needing to be told, and his face lit up with the most radiant smile Mu Qing had ever seen. 

Mu Qing's legs went weak. 

  
In the end, once everything had settled down, Mu Qing realised that not much had ended up changing at all. 

It was actually quite amusing to watch it all happen - the few Heavenly Officials who had been close enough to hear their clumsy confessions had immediately started to spread the story like wildfire, but upon seeing the two Generals entering the Heavenly Court, bloodied and bickering and seemingly as they always had been, they started to doubt their hearing. 

"Are you sure you heard right? Look at them -" 

"Oh, look, General Nan Yang just hit General Xuan Zhen over the head with his bow - did they really say that?" 

"Haha, no way. Can you imagine it?" 

"I heard them say it! I swear! General Xuan Zhen went all red and -" 

"That's just the blood, you idiot, zombies bleed like crazy when you stab them with a sword - "

"... do you think so?"

Feng Xin hastily turned his laughter into a coughing fit, and Mu Qing struggled to stop himself from grinning. He ended up spending the next few weeks pretending not to notice his subordinates whispering to each other every time he passed by, and blatantly turning away from the rather obvious pair of young officials from the Palace of Nan Yang spying on him and Feng Xin as they walked together towards the Palace of Ling Wen to report back after their missions. 

It wasn't like they were trying to hide anything. Neither him nor Feng Xin were much for dramatics - they fell back into their normal routines of loud disagreements and petty arguments, and on the surface, it might have seemed like nothing had changed for them at all. But there were also times when they cloaked themselves to hide from the other Heavenly Officials and snuck out to one of their more remote temples, spending a few hours away from prying eyes, alone together. Other times they would visit each other's palaces up in the Heavenly Court, and their subordinates would wonder why they didn't hear the usual yelling and clang of crossed swords that normally resulted from the two martial gods being in the same room as each other. And then there were those times when Mu Qing would snatch Feng Xin away, drag him behind closed doors where nobody would hear or see them, and they would -

"They're getting along a bit better these days, aren't they?" said Shi Qingxuan innocently, observing as the two generals sat under a tree, bickering, the two brooms they were meant to be sweeping the Pu Qi shrine with lying forgotten in the dust. 

Xie Lian and Hua Cheng glanced at each other, and smiled knowingly. 

"It seems that way, doesn't it?" 


End file.
